On 16 November 1963, President Kennedy made a whirlwind visit to Canaveral
and Merritt Island, his third visit in 21 months. Administrator Webb, Dr. Debus,
and General Davis greeted the President as his Boeing 707 landed. At launch
complex 37 he was briefed on the Saturn program. The President then boarded a
helicopter with Debus to view Merritt Island, and flew over the coast line to
watch a successful Polaris launching from the nuclear submarine Andrew
Jackson.41

The next week the President died by an assassin's bullet in Dallas, The new
President, Lyndon B. Johnson, announced he was renaming the Cape Canaveral
Auxiliary Air Force Base and NASA Launch Operations Center as the John F.
Kennedy Space Center. With the support of Governor Farris Bryant of Florida, the
President also changed the name of Cape Canaveral to Cape Kennedy. The next day
he followed up his statement with Executive Order No. 11129. In this he did not
mention a new name for the Cape, but did join the civilian and military
installations under one name, thus causing some confusion. To clarify the
matter, Administrator Webb issued a NASA directive changing the name of the
Launch Operations Center to the "John F. Kennedy Space Center, NASA," and an Air
Force general order changed the name of the air base to the "Cape Kennedy Air
Force Station." The United States Board of Geographic Names of the Department of
the Interior officially accepted the name Cape Kennedy for Cape Canaveral the
following year.42

People at the Cape seemed to approve the naming of the spaceport as a
memorial to President Kennedy. Up to that time, the Launch Operations Center had
only the descriptive name. Debus wrote a little later: "The renaming of our
facilities to the John F. Kennedy Space Center, NASA, is the result of an
Executive Order, but to me it is also fitting recognition to his personal and
intense involvement in the National Space Program."43
Many in the Brevard area, however, felt that changing the name of Cape
Canaveral, one of the oldest place-names in the country, dating back to the
earliest days of Spanish exploration, was a mistaken gesture. After a stirring
debate in the town council, the city of Cape Canaveral declined to change its
name.*

* Although efforts to have Congress restore the name "Canaveral" to
the Cape failed, Governor Reubin Askew signed a bill on 29 May 1973 that
returned the name on Florida State maps and documents. On 9 October 1973 the
Board of Geographic Names, U.S. Department of the Interior, did likewise for
federal usage.